


Play Pretend

by orphan_account



Series: bot things [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AI AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-04
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-06-21 19:20:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15564705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Deleted scenes taking place somewhere in the middle of 'Imperative'And what good was being artificial if he wasn't going to take advantage of it? If Mycroft didn't want Jim, well, he'd just become someone else.





	Play Pretend

 

Jim swings his legs off the work table, eager to get to a mirror. A hand on his shoulder stops him.

 

"You really do care for those boys, don't you?"

 

Jim looks up at Mr. Holmes, carefully keeping his expression blank. He feels a jolt of fury at the question but isn't quite sure why.

 

"Sure," he says nonchalantly. The man studies his face, and Jim scowls at that. A moment later he's immediately sorry. He's got nothing against Mr. Holmes, he really doesn't. But he's got things to do, people to see.

 

People being Mycroft, mostly.

 

Jim stands before the mirror, holding the gaze of his new reflection. A new body in a newly fitted suit. Mr. Holmes has done an admirable job, as usual. Although they skipped a few formative years, the stark change in almost every part of his body denotes only a seamless upward rise in age.

 

Jim has only had this body mere hours, but it feels every bit his own as the first one. More, even. It feels like, should he cut that arm he sees in the reflection, it would hurt him deeply.

 

.

 

The meeting goes horribly, and as soon as Jim puts some distance between him and Mycroft, as soon as he gets on the train, he decides he's not going back.

 

He has a fleeting thought - what good is a body if all the good it allows him is to feel this fresh pain? He dismisses it immediately, turning his thoughts around almost gratefully, almost ecstatically, and wonders if this new chassis might possibly allow him access a broader range than he previously was able to experience.

 

If so, it would be remiss of him to sit around wallowing in one set of feelings when there was a whole world of them he could throw himself into now.

 

He writes a letter and makes arrangements.

 

.

 

Jim barely lasts over half a year.

 

Three new continents and four relationships later, his need to see Mycroft is annoyingly persistent. What for? Jim doubts he'd share any particular insights upon listening to Jim's story. Jim doubts he'd listen, full stop.

 

He decides this new feeling, the one where he fears Mycroft thinks himself better off without Jim, is the worst one yet.

 

.

 

Jim shows up on Mr. Holmes's doorstep donning a grim expression, ready to ask a favor.

 

Mr. Holmes's expression is unreadable as he considers his request, and Jim nearly thinks he's going to try to talk him out of it, but then the man nods.

 

He breathes a sigh of relief he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

 

.

 

Designing a person from scratch is more difficult than Jim realized.

 

First, he has to curb any impulse to idealize, to draw the features he thinks would most appeal. It helps that he realizes he has no idea what Mycroft's "type" is.

 

They're almost done when Mr. Holmes finally asks, "Are you sure you want to do this?"

 

It catches Jim off guard. He'd expected this earlier. And with more insistence - not this tone of nonchalance.

 

Weren't there, perhaps, ethical reasons for not changing your entire body, becoming a different person, unless you had the right reason? There were no objectively right reasons, Jim knows that, he knows Mr. Holmes likely knows that, but he expected token resistance if not some sort of wisdom that might persuade him to change his mind.

 

But, perhaps this nonchalant detachment from social codes was what allowed the man to help his teenaged son create an artificial life form to begin with.

 

And what good was being artificial if he wasn't going to take advantage of it? If Mycroft didn't want Jim, well, he'd just become someone else.

 

"Of course I'm sure," Jim responds.

 

Mr. Holmes nods.

 

"Don't be surprised if you feel differently once in the new body," he says, and Jim startles.

 

"A different height, even by a few centimeters, means a different perspective. You might be surprised how easily that can lend itself to a different worldview. And then, of course, perhaps the biggest change of all is how people might look at you. The eyes of others, upon our own, shapes who we are."

 

Jim frowns. He has planned for this already. He knows this. No need to get nervous now.

 

.

 

Harry Strauss has soft, tawny hair and kind amber eyes. He's tall, even taller than Mycroft, with broad shoulders, but the self-effacing air about him and unobtrusive but respectable posture means he rarely looms, and certainly isn't imposing.

 

He gains a temporary position as an personal assistant to a prominent government official through family means and a good resume, and soon becomes liaison to various ministries.

 

As such, he meets at least once weekly with Mycroft Holmes.

 

.

 

"I'm only a minor official in the department, I assure you," Mycroft says, handing him a card with a convoluted title listing assistant this and deputy that to the vice whatever.

 

Harry smiles. "And I'm just a personal assistant, Mr. Holmes. Filling in for Mr. Fenwick, as you know. I hope to get along."

 

Surprisingly, Mycroft smiles back.

 

.

 

The meetings are utterly pleasant and congenial and Jim has never, ever shared Mycroft’s company like this. He, more than once, forgets himself fully as they politely discuss budgets line items from labor costs to arms procurement. He lets himself bask in the gratification of Mycroft, week by week, sitting closer, or leaning in, using his first name unprompted and looking bashful about it afterward.

 

“I apologize,” Mycroft says when he shows Harry the door after their drawn-out discussion. “I must have forgotten myself. You must forgive me being so familiar - you are, surprisingly - surprising for me, at least - very easy to converse with.”

 

Harry pauses in the doorway, unwilling to part ways as easily as he has done the days before. The words are stuck in his throat as he tries to find a way to shape them in as considerate a manner his personality demands.

 

“I - I’m only filling in for Mr. Fenwick for two weeks more,” he says. “After that...we’ll no longer be working together.”

 

He trails off, and for a moment is afraid Mycroft will take the wrong meaning. Then understanding dawns, and he’s rewarded with a blush.

 

.

 

The end of those two weeks comes slowly, and on some days, the days where he has no reason to see Mycroft and needs to invent an excuse, feels forever away.

 

A few days in, a few days after he’s voiced this revelation, he starts to plan. It doesn’t even occur to Jim that, once, he would have already had not just one, but possibly a dozen plans that led up to this result, and then a dozen more for what would happen beyond it. Harry is far less calculating when it comes to matters of the heart.

 

He daydreams about that first date, wondering where the take Mycroft. What they might talk about. How they would proceed.

 

Each and every time, the fantasy grows more elaborate, the story grows in length.

 

By the time it is their last day working together, Harry has planned a beautiful little speech with which to ask Mycroft to dine with him, and a detailed little day trip to the countryside. He plans to ask him the very next day once his contract with the government has completely ended.

 

But it’s on Jim’s walk home that he remembers himself. He can see a future with Mycroft like this, and the realization wracks through his body. Mycroft - settling down, growing into old age with Harry Strauss.

 

Jim can’t help - and is utterly shocked - at the wave of hurt and jealousy.

 

His hands shake, as he tries to unlock his front door.

 

.

 

“Are you sure?” Mr. Holmes asks, nonchalant as ever, taking Jim’s nod in response in stride. There are parts strewn all over the workshop that Jim doesn’t care about. Mr. Holmes seems to be working on something big. He bypasses them, though, to show Jim what looks at first almost like a tanning bed.

 

“If you want to go back to the initial model,” he continues, speaking of Jim as work rather than a person, the way his sons never had, “you won’t be able to change again.”

 

Jim walks over to peer down into the coffin-sized box Mr. Holmes opens up.

 

It’s him.

 

Jim, nearly the same as he’d left him when he became Harry, lies bathed in blue light inside a white box.

 

“I’d experimented with more organic material - self-repairing tissue, something resembling lymphatic system to aid with some circuitry shortcuts,” Mr. Holmes explains.

 

Jim reaches out to touch it.

 

“Anyway, it is a lot of work,” Mr. Holmes says, adding a careless wave of his hand to denote he’d finishing explaining as much as he was willing. “You can have it, but you’ll be stuck with it.”

 

“I - you mean I’ll grow with it?” Jim asks. Mycroft had never mentioned this. He didn’t know. This was new. He felt something bubble in his stomach, in his chest, and rolled his shoulders involuntarily as he thought it over.

 

“More or less, yes,” Mr. Holmes says. “Still some differences. I have a manual. Come and see.”

 

Jim follows.

 


End file.
